A man who successfully sued the Ottawa police force after a judge ruled he had been racially profiled is back before the court, accused of pimping and beating his teenaged girlfriend.

Jordan Noel, 27, received a small settlement from the Ottawa Police Service after his drug charges were tossed in 2011. Police now allege he made money by forcing an 18-year-old woman to sell herself for sex.

Patrol officers responded to a report of an assault in Barrhaven on Sept. 2. Once they arrived, they arrested Noel. Detectives charged him with trafficking his girlfriend, receiving money from the trafficking, two counts of assault, threatening her, pimping her, advertising her sexual services, theft and breach of probation.

Noel raps under the name Reggie Slums. Videos posted on YouTube reveal lyrics influenced by criminal culture: “If you f*ck with my money, I’ll lay you down … and we got them guns that hold a lot of rounds,” “when it comes to the drugs, I got it. I’m out here everyday cause I make a profit,” and “when I found some Robert Borden, I made a fortune. I was either selling drugs or doing extortion.”

Court records show that Noel has convictions for assaulting someone while in jail, robbery, carrying a concealed weapon, possession of a firearm obtained by crime, and drug trafficking.

It was a set of tossed criminal charges that first thrust Noel into the spotlight. In July 2011, the Crown withdrew drug charges against both Noel and Loik St. Louis, then 24. Noel and St. Louis were driving Noel’s mother’s 1997 Cadillac Deville in August 2010 when a constable pulled them over.

Const. Robin Ferrie testified at the preliminary hearing that the young men caught his eye because they were in a high-crime area but refused to look at him as they drove past — behaviour Ferrie said was suspicious since most people will look at a uniformed officer in a police cruiser.

Ferrie ran the licence plate and discovered that the car was registered to an older woman. He testified he was concerned it might have been stolen. Once the car was pulled over, police discovered 13 grams of marijuana, five grams of crack cocaine, a drug scale and nearly $1,700 in cash that later went missing from the evidence room.

At the preliminary hearing, Ontario Court Justice Dianne Nicholas asked the officer to explain the reason for the stop. His notes suggested it was for suspicious males in a high-drug area, but in another report he wrote that the stop was conducted because two young males were driving a Cadillac.

“It sure sounds like racial profiling to me,” Nicholas said. “How many white women do you stop in the market just because they are driving a car?” Nicholas asked Ferrie.

The money was later returned to the men and then-chief Vern White launched an internal probe into the matter. White also later called Ferrie’s actions “good police work.”

Noel said in an interview at the time that he felt he “was disrespected, discriminated against and judged because of my colour and because I was driving a Cadillac.”

Noel said he couldn’t explain why there were drugs in the car. “I never knew there were drugs in the vehicle,” he said, at the time. “These guys search the car and then there are drugs there.”

In 2012, both Noel and St. Louis sued the police board and three officers for $95,000 each, plus legal costs. Noel alleged he was falsely arrested and imprisoned. He accused police of breaching his Charter rights and conducting a negligent investigation.

The statement of claim also alleged that Noel experienced emotional and psychological suffering, stress, anxiety, depression and sleeplessness. The lawsuit also said he felt unsafe around police and distrusted people in power since the traffic stop.

Noel did receive a settlement, but sources say it was for barely more than $10,000.

Noel’s release on bail last Thursday while he awaits trial on human trafficking charges comes on the heels of a public reveal of a two-year race data project that found that Ottawa police officers disproportionately pulled over middle eastern and black drivers.

Noel was released into his mother’s custody. He is to live with her, abide by a 9 p.m. curfew, not contact the alleged victim, not access escort services or use an escort website and not go to strip clubs or other escort agencies. Noel is also to present himself at his mother’s front door within five minutes of Ottawa police officers’ arriving for a curfew check.

Whether racial profiling is carried out by Ottawa police continues to be a concern for human rights advocates after the release of the data results, the July in-custody death of 37-year-old Somali Canadian Abdirahman Abdi, and racist comments a forensic identification officer made on Facebook under a Citizen article about the death of Inuk artist Annie Pootoogook.

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